This Ad Is Genuinely Funny

Genuinely.

"I love what I'm getting out of you, Blue Cougar!"

Obviously, I agree wholeheartedly. I always find a danger with conservatives is this: Because we all sort of... are rejectivists of the system, we sort of have a distaste for conventional politics, we look down on that as sort of join-ey, something liberal.

We sort of want to engage in para-politics, something akin to politics but not actually part of the political process. As the ad mentions: Writin' emails. Lettin' liberals know our home is our castle.

I asked my friend steve_in_hb why he never voted, despite having some fairly firm political beliefs, and I think he encapsulated the rejectivist conservative opinion on this pretty succinctly. He said:

"Voting is for fags."

And it's one of those jokes, you know, like most jokes: Yes, it's a joke. Yes, his tongue is firmly in cheek. Yes, he was just trying to get a laughing rise out of me (and succeeded).

But yes: It is also sort of true.

Now, in a serious way, he wouldn't say this; but he would say something about the pointlessness of a corrupt system and so on.

This is always, always a danger for conservatives, and what keeps our representation below what it ought to be: a rejectivism that leads many to not even bother to vote at all, despite having very, very strong opinions about which candidate ought to win what race.

Friends, the time for living off the political grid is over. It's time to engage.

Voting is a right won for us by force of arms, by the blood and courage of strong men, and a responsibility passed down to us from them, our debt back to them. We honor them by voting and we dishonor them by standing on the sidelines, passively allowing our political destinies to be determined by other people.

Good men died for this right, and killed for it. It is precious as blood. It's not to be cast aside as a cheap bauble.

I really do read too many people expounding on the Constitution and then, when asked, stating that voting is beneath their dignity.

I don't know. Seems to me there's a major disconnect there. Unless you've earned the right by other means (such as serving the country's armed forces), I'm really not sure you've earned the right to disclaim about the Constitution if you can't even be bothered to take a ten minute trip to the post office and sign up to be counted as a Citizen of the United States of America.

Ah: A way to put steve's joke is this: Voting is for goody-goods who believe in "civic duty" and all that rot.

Conservatives, often, are very anti-bullshit; they like cutting bullshit out of their lives. But for too many, they toss "voting" into the bullshit column (and then wonder how we wind up with the Mensa Chapter Presidents we call Senators).

Conservatives like to style themselves (and frequently are) rebels, sort of outlaws, sort of loose cannon mavericks who play by their own rules and get their badges and guns taken away every week from their constipated Sergeant when they blow up a truck full of liquid nitrogen in pursuit of a hot-rod smugging Krugerrands and sex-slaves.

And then that leads to showing "rebellion" by not participating in voting.

I think what this ad is getting at isn't portraying conservatives as bumpkins, but this sort of Rebel Without a Voter Card as a bumpkin, a bumpkin who's deluding himself into thinking he's actually "teaching the system a lesson" by writin' emails and otherwise consigning himself to political irrelevancy.

posted by Ace at 03:01 PM

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